


Gamblers, Gallantry, and Patience

by SonjaJade



Category: Samurai Champloo
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-15
Updated: 2012-06-15
Packaged: 2017-11-07 19:36:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/434614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SonjaJade/pseuds/SonjaJade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>*POST CANON* Jin's sojourn in Hamamatsu pays off big time. Definitely based on episode 11.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gamblers, Gallantry, and Patience

**Title:** Gamblers, Gallantry, and Patience  
 **Author/Artist:** Sonja Jade  
 **Fandom:** Samurai Champloo  
 **Characters/Pairings:** Jin/Shino (If you saw episode 11 you know this ficlet HAD to be written), OC  
 **Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters within this story based on the series Samurai Champloo  
 **Summary/Teaser:** He's suddenly aware that his heart is beginning to beat faster in anticipation, regardless of his consciousness telling him he's just going to be disappointed when it's not Shino.  
 **Rating:** PG-13  
 **Word Count:** 1,145

* * *

When Jin makes his nightly trek to the dock, he honestly doesn't expect to see any sign of her. It's been three years since Shino went across the river to the refuge, and he's been checking that same tired dock three times a day for months now. Not once has she ever been there, and something inside him wonders how much longer he's going to keep waiting for her.

The snow is falling slow and soft, nothing too heavy. It's not even sticking to the grass along the bank, so at least he doesn't have to worry about ice on his way back into the gambling district where his tiny room is. With a quiet huff, he turns to leave. At the top of the embankment, he looks once more, and this time he sees the pinpoint of a lantern coming closer from the opposite side of the river. His heart leaps but his mind is quick to dash his hopes, thinking it's probably just someone coming in for the gambling or the brothel or one of Hamamatsu's many other distractions. Still, he waits eagerly to find out who would come across the river on a freezing cold night like this.

The small boat moves closer and closer. He hears a young boy speaking to a woman but he can't make out what they're saying just yet. He's suddenly aware that his heart is beginning to beat faster in anticipation, regardless of his consciousness telling him he's just going to be disappointed when it's not Shino. Their conversation dies the closer to the dock they get, much to Jin's dismay, but then finally the boy ties the vessel off and helps the woman out. She's carrying something rather large in her arms and she drops some coin into the boy's hand before turning to shuffle away…

And when she looks up to climb the short set of steps to the road, Jin nearly hits his knees in gratitude to the Kami…

It's Shino.

"Jin?" she asks in a trembling voice, the droplets brewing in her eyes catching the moonlight and giving the appearance of sparkling diamonds resting on her lashes.

He wastes no time in snatching her up in his arms and embracing her tightly. Her lips seek his, and when they meet she bursts into tears that his icy thumbs brush away. He wants to say something to her, anything, just to know she's real and that she knows it's him but he can't seem to make his voice work. He swallows and tries again, this time getting out the words he's been waiting to tell her: "I've missed you."

It's then that the object she's carrying shifts in her grip and he attempts to take and carry it for her, but she only holds the thing tighter. He gives her a confused look and she says quietly, "Not here. Somewhere warm and private, please…"

Unable to carry the object, he resolves to carry both of them instead all the way back to his room, ignoring the cat calls from the hoodlums in the end of town where he stayed. Once safely inside, he sets her on her feet and locks the door, stopping only to stoke the fire before kissing her deeply.

She's more beautiful than Jin remembers and he does his best to not openly stare at her, but it's so hard. It seems Shino just wants to gaze at him as well, but she seems on edge… Was she afraid of her husband still?

"Your husband was beaten to death two years ago," he tells her quietly, one hand softly squeezing her arm as the other tenderly holds her face. "He didn't pay up on a debt, and the man he owed took his life in exchange. I swear to you my swords never touched him."

Shino looks down at the object that is still wrapped up in her arms. "Good."

"Can I ask what you have that is so precious?" Jin inquires. He watches as her bottom lip slips between her teeth, and she slowly nods. Her delicate hands begin to unwrap the object. Layer after layer of cotton is pulled back… and finally a sleeping child is revealed to him.

The only sound in the room is Shino's panicked breath and the light snores of her baby. "H-his name is Eiji, he's two years and four months old… and I don't know who he belongs to."

Jin looks at the toddler in her arms, scrutinizing his features to see if anything about Eiji resembles himself. He's fairly certain that he doesn't belong to her husband, and there's no way of politely asking her how many men she'd been with in the short time she was at the brothel. And then he sees something that slightly curls the corners of his mouth. "He's mine."

"Are you sure?" Shino breathes.

Jin takes his glasses off and points to his left eye. "This eye is closer to my nose than my right. His eye is the same." He also takes Eiji's chubby hand and point out the odd shape of their thumbnails, they way their middle and ring fingers are nearly the same length on both hands, and when he asks if his littlest toes face outward rather than upward, Shino's tears begin to fall again. "This child is mine, no doubt."

He offers his bed to them, saying that in the morning they will leave Hamamatsu for Nagoya, where he knew Fuu was living with her new husband. He wants to take his new family somewhere safe, somewhere Eiji can play without worry of being kidnapped or worse. It will be good to be around kind people again, to be near a friend who will be as happy for him as he is for himself. "But before we leave, we'll go to the registrar and have you listed as my wife." Then he adds sheepishly, "If that's alright with you, that is."

"Of course, Jin," she smiles at him as she tucks their boy into his thin mattress and blankets. "We'd better get some sleep if we're going to be travelling tomorrow." She lies back and holds the blankets back, inviting him to her side in the bed.

For the first time in a long time, Jin _smirks_. "I can't promise to keep my hands off of you."

Shino returns his mirthful gaze and replies, "And who says I want to just sleep?"

"And Eiji?" he asks as he crawls in beside her, burying his nose in her neck and reassuring himself he's not dreaming.

"He sleeps like a rock, he won't know a thing," she whispers as she slips a hand inside the warmth of his juban and feels of his scarred, muscular chest.

"Then allow me to properly welcome you home," Jin says as his lips brush against hers.

**A/N:** I assume SamCham takes place sometime around the same time as Kenshin in the Meiji era, and at that time it was still common for parents to make love in the same bed as a sleeping child and no one thought anything of it. Remember, it's Japan: a distant land in a distant time; a culture completely different from the modern west.


End file.
